DANBURY — Enrollment at Danbury Public Schools is relatively flat this year over last, but district leaders are concerned the growth is inching the district closer to its physical capacity.

If the student population continues its 16 consecutive years of growth, the district could have to consider building a new school — an expensive and politically difficult endeavor given the ever-tightening city and state budgets.

This fall, the district begins a pair of studies re-examining its enrollment trends and the number of students the district can fit onto its campuses.

“We need to start talking about building another school, one or two,” longtime school board member Gladys Cooper said. “Maybe they’ll laugh, but if you don’t ask and don’t work together, how will we know what we’re going to get?

“What are we going to do when we can’t put any more portables?” she said.

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Overall, student enrollment at all Danbury schools is up 49 students over last year, bringing the total to 11,510 in all of its kindergarten through high school classes, according to district statistics presented Wednesday night.

But that relatively small overall increase hides the nearly 200 additional elementary and middle school students who joined the district this year, but were offset in part by some decreases in the high school grades, the statistics show.

The numbers

Enrollment in the Danbury school district for the past five years shows steady incrases.

2018: 11,510

2017: 11,461

2016: 11,373

2015: 11,157

2014: 10,912

That leaves the enrollment number reported to the state about flat, but indicates the district is still trending toward growth, finance director Joe Martino said. In the final days before the semester started, the district was adding 40 to 50 children every day and more will enroll throughout the year, he said.

Looking over the past decade, the district has grown by more than 1,500 students and could break 12,000 within four years, estimates show.

To absorb the growth, the district has spent years expanding its campuses with modular classrooms and major additions and renovations.

In August, the district opened its two-year, $53.3 million expansion of Danbury High School — already the largest in the state — as its student population nears 3,200. The three-story complex includes science labs, more than two dozen new classrooms, several offices, space for athletic trainers, additional locker rooms and a smaller, second gymnasium that can double as an overflow cafeteria.

At Westside Middle School Academy, crews are still building eight modular classrooms to increase its capacity to 750 students, up from 600.

But at some point in the next few years, district officials concede they will run out of options.

“Your challenge with your schools is that there are few schools that are virtually out of land,” Martino said. “Some of those schools have no usable grass left to take, but there’s a few we’re going to study. That would look at current facilties but also options on renovations.”

The board has formed a facilities and sites committee to study the issue and work with a consultant on its enrollment estimates and maximum facility capacity, Superintendent Sal Pascarella said.

Those studies will at least give the board some basis for how to proceed over the next several years, whether that entails renovations or considering an entirely new school, board members agreed.

“These schools don’t have any space,” board member Farley Santos said. “Having a study to prove that would say, ‘Look, we are looking at every single inch of the buildings and we don’t have any more room, we have to do something.’ That’s the important part of having this study.”